


but i swear it was in self defense

by belatrix



Category: The Mentalist
Genre: Crack, Episode: s04e24 The Crimson Hat, Gen, Jane is gorgeous and he uses it, everyone is fed up, seriously don't take this seriously
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-16
Updated: 2017-02-16
Packaged: 2018-09-24 20:14:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9784349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/belatrix/pseuds/belatrix
Summary: “At least nobody got hurt,” Rigsby says helpfully, and Cho shoots him a look that suggests he’s an idiot. And Lisbon, she really hasn’t got the time for all this.“Jane and Wainwright are missing,” she says, for what is probably the eight-hundredth time that day. “And, fine, Wainwright might have just run away for all we know, but Jane was with Red freaking John and now he’sgone.Which means his plan went to hell and he’s been kidnapped, like always.”Cho is very stoic, as Cho usually is. “I mean,” he starts, “it wasn’t even a plan in the first place.”Van Pelt puts a hand on his shoulder, shaking her head sadly. “Shh, let him have this.”Jane... accepts Red John’s offer of friendship. It does not go well for anyone involved.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sirenofodysseus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirenofodysseus/gifts).



> for amber, who keeps keeping me invested in this fandom with her ridiculously awesome stories. 
> 
> _utter_ crack!fic. a little meta. not j/rj, but getting there. maybe. or not. probably not.
> 
> (also: YES i am petty and salty and the title comes from _**that**_ song)
> 
> ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

 

 

Cramped into a ridiculously fancy car in the middle of nowhere, Patrick Jane knows he’d do just about anything for the sweet mercy of air-conditioning.

He can _smell_ himself. He’s painfully aware of his shirt sticking to his back with sweat, sore from all the unnecessary beating and mildly surprised that Lorelei doesn’t seem at all bothered by the ungodly heat. She looks calm and serene, in the patented brainwashed way that makes hardened CBI agents reach for the painkillers in the interrogation room.

Oblivious, or perhaps simply indifferent, Red John keeps merrily talking away, and his voice makes Jane want to kick a puppy in the face.

“What if you and I were friends?” Red John asks, reminding Jane of that girl back in the carnival who asked him on a date fifteen times in a row on the same day. He’d said no. All fifteen times. Lorelei’s looking at the source of the disembodied voice like she wants to make out with the car’s dashboard and Jane makes a low choking sound in the back of his throat.

“Imagine the life we could lead,” Red John insists. “It’s a higher path, Patrick, a nobler existence.”

 _Go fuck yourself with a cactus_ isn’t something a gentleman might say, so Jane decides to settle on something relatively classier. _Go to hell_ sounds appropriate enough, but Jane is at a rather disadvantageous position as it is. Lisbon and the team should have descended upon Red John’s men like the Four Horsemen already, but they’re nowhere to be seen, and he supposes Red John wouldn’t be particularly happy about being insulted yet again.

Jane has to try very, very hard to keep from pinching the bridge of his nose and letting out a frustrated sigh. “Fine.”

Lorelei blinks, owlish, and turns to look at him as if he’s suggested taking out a jerrycan and setting himself on fire just to see what it’d be like.

“Fine?”

“Yes, _fine_ ,” Jane grinds out. It’s a tragedy that he can’t fully appreciate the shock in Red John’s voice. “You want a partner in crime, I can be your partner in crime. You’re right, I can’t go on like this.”

“…right.” The silence that follows is heavy and contemplative and ridiculous.

This time, Jane does sigh. He thinks he can feel a headache coming on. “Jesus Christ, I’m not trying to _trick_ you. It obviously didn’t work very well any of the times I’ve done it, so. Yes or no?”

 

 

It’s taking every last ounce of Lisbon’s willpower not to punch a hole through the nearest wall.

The only good thing to come out of this situation: she has no overwhelming stacks of paperwork to deal with.

Because she’s _suspended_.

“At least nobody got hurt,” Rigsby says helpfully, and Cho shoots him a look that suggests he’s an idiot. And Lisbon, she really hasn’t got the time for all this.

“Jane and Wainwright are _missing_ ,” she says, for what is probably the eight-hundredth time that day. “And, fine, Wainwright might have just run away for all we know, but Jane was with Red freaking John and now he’s _gone_. Which means his plan went to hell and he’s been kidnapped, like always.”

Cho is very stoic, as Cho usually is. “I mean,” he starts, “it wasn’t even a plan in the first place.”

Van Pelt puts a hand on his shoulder, shaking her head sadly. “Shh, let him have this.”

“He’s not even _here_ , Van Pelt.”

Lisbon runs a shaky hand through her hair. Somewhere in the back, Darcy is asking everyone all sorts of questions about Operation Teresa Lisbon’s Head In A Box, frowning formidably and snarling about Jane’s ardent obsession with Red John, Red John’s ardent obsession with Jane, the CBI’s cowboy-cop practices and there’s something in there about the aforementioned psychotic men having unhealthy crushes on each other and quite possibly an affair, which Lisbon very deliberately refuses to hear because she’s too young to die of an aneurysm just yet.

“Seriously though,” Rigsby pipes in, rather timidly. “What if Jane _did_ go with Red John willingly?”

Cho rolls his eyes and folds his arms together, which is the most eloquent he’ll probably get for another week. _Thine biceps shalt speaketh for thou_.

“That’s nice, Wayne,” Van Pelt says, and Lisbon gives up and slumps forward, letting her head hit her desk with a loud thud.

 

 

“Patrick, dear, eat your vegetables.”

Jane wonders if it’s too late now to run away screaming.

Considering the life he’s led, Patrick Jane can safely say that he’s been in a lot of weird, surrealistic, downright impossible situations. _This_ , without a shadow of doubt, makes the top three.

The food is mostly untouched in his plate, and Red John is worriedly looking at him from across the table, like a longsuffering suburban mom about to embark on a Why Broccoli Is Good For Your Health, Jimmy, monologue.

“I refuse to believe you just called me _dear_.”

Red John spears a bite of steak and averts his gaze. “I thought we’d be more pleasant to each other. I’ve gone as far as letting you walk around wherever you please. I haven’t even tied you to the _chair_.” He brings the fork to his mouth, chewing quickly. “I’m not _forcing_ you to be here.”

“Right.” Jane leans forward, and Red John gives him a very offended look when he puts his elbows on the table. “Apart from threatening to kill everyone I’ve ever met if I try anything _funny_ , you’ve been a most wonderful host.”

“More wine?”

Jane takes a steadying breath and lets the air out slowly through his nose. “You know, for a serial killer, you’re spectacularly boring. Let me just name the hundred other people I’d rather be talking to, right now.”

“That was unnecessary.”

“You’re unnecessary.” Jane’s fingers start drumming away an abstract rhythm on the table. He thinks, briefly, that he should have simply let Red John’s men kill him and dump his body in that godforsaken stretch of desert. _That_ would have been less excruciating. “Aren’t you supposed to be helping me create a new life? So far, all we’ve done is have breakfast and lunch and dinner and talk about utter nonsense. In the same ugly room, every single time.”

Red John’s eyebrows shoot up in horror. “My house is not ugly.”

“There’s a _Van Gogh_ hanging on a _red wall_ ,” Jane says, shuddering. “And white curtains. And that white table from Ikea. It’s _haunting_. It gave me nightmares.”

Red John swallows, and stares. “Just. Just eat your fucking vegetables.”

The next day, Jane is confined to the guest room because Red John has brought a team of Manhattan decorators to revamp the entire place. Jane throws his hands up in the air and wishes for oblivion.

 

 

“So,” Jane says, turning to look at himself in the mirror. Red John was kind enough to buy him new clothes, since a quick dash back to Jane’s place was determinedly out of the question. Jane swallows down a lump in his throat when he sees just how tight the pants are in the back. “What’s today’s plan?”

“I’m kind of busy today,” Red John says from his spot on the bed. He gives an appreciative little hum at the sight of Jane tugging on the waist of his dress pants, and Jane allows himself to imagine how Red John’s intestines might look if worn as garters.

“Really. What kind of business?”

“Well.” If Jane didn’t know any better, he might say Red John looked mildly embarrassed. Which, _pffft_. “I haven’t been to work in days, Patrick. People are wondering.”

Jane blinks, and has to bite down a scathing response. In the end he says, “great. I’m coming with you.”

“Uh. _Well_. I―”

“Oh, come on. Are we best friends now or not?”

 

 

Jane lets himself bask in all the golden sunlight. “Ah,” he says, merry and lilting. “I see. It really is a higher path, a nobler existence.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Napa Valley is an endless expanse of vineyards, restaurants, vineyards, restaurants, and a couple more vineyards. If one is especially lucky, they might come across yet another vineyard or restaurant.

“Do I have to wear a uniform, too?” Jane asks innocently. He knows he’d look good in anything (Lisbon’s disapproving scowl echoes in his brain, ‘ _Arrogant son of a bitch’_ ), but still he’d rather keep his three piece suit, inappropriately tight or not. Besides, he’s never been much of a hat person, either, because his _hair_.

Red John runs a hand over his face. He looks rather defeated. “Please. Stop talking.”

Jane grins brightly. “Hey. I’m not being sarcastic. I know for a fact women love a man in a uniform, it’s in every science book.” He waggles his eyebrows, “finally, I understand why Lorelei’s so desperately in love.”

It’s a good thing they’re in a crowded place, because Jane is very certain Red John wants nothing but to shoot him on both knees and feed him his own eyeballs. Instead, the man only shakes his head in an exasperated manner that reminds Jane oddly of Lisbon. And, really, anyone else who's had to share a space with Jane for more than a few hours.

“Here,” Red John says, attempting to steer the conversation elsewhere. “Have a donut. I get them for free.”

Jane feels like laughing, but he stops himself before it gets that far.

 

 

“I’m not doing this.”

Red John pointedly rolls his eyes. He’s very capable of getting behind the drama queen persona when committed, Jane thinks. Which is not surprising.

“Really, Patrick, from the way you’re reacting you’d think I’m asking you to court Gale Bertram.”

Jane shuts his eyes against the mental image of him on a bended knee before the CBI boss’ boss, and even Red John seems vaguely disgusted at the thought. However. “This is even worse,” Jane says, with feeling. “I’m not doing _finger freaking painting_ with you.”

“I thought we were partners now, dear,” Red John says, giving Jane quite the creepy smile. “We have to find some common ground. I’ll teach you.”

Jane resists the urge to rub at his temples. “I’m not becoming a baby serial killer apprentice,” he growls, directing his best glare at Red John. “Besides. The whole smiley face thing is absolutely _tasteless_.”

At the sight before him, Jane wills the words back once they’ve left his lips. Red John’s eyes go wide, his mouth slightly agape. He looks like someone had the audacity to suggest Blake’s poetry is a bunch of kindergarten limericks, right in front of him.

Jane swallows, holding his hands up in a placating gesture. “Now, don’t―”

“ _What_. Did you just _say_.”

Jane shuts his mouth and doesn’t move a single muscle. 

_Please don’t cry_ , he thinks.

Red John’s lower lip wobbles.

 _Fucking shit_.

 

 

Two and a half bottles of scotch and an obliterated bedroom later, Jane finds himself sitting beside Red John on the bed, awkwardly positioned so that their knees don’t touch.

“You were right,” Red John says into his hands, and it sounds more like a sob than anything else. “It’s just. It’s _just_ , you were right, I am so fucking lonely. And I’ll cut your throat and shove a knife up your ass if you ever say this to anyone else, but, fuck, I really am lonely and ugly and sad and I can’t―”

“Now, now,” Jane says, wishing for someone to hit him on the head with a shovel so he doesn’t have to hear this. He thinks he’s never felt this mortified in his entire life, including that time Raoul the Knife-Swallower hung him from his underwear on the ferris wheel as retribution for some perceived slight Jane couldn't remember if he tried.

“No, no, it’s true,” Red John screeches, waving his arm around so suddenly Jane has to do a dive onto the mattress to avoid getting hit in the face. “It’s true, and you, _you_ ―” he makes a snuffling sound and Jane commits mental suicide at having heard this, “you just waltz around with your fancy smile and your fancy suits and your fancy hair and you look like you’re fucking photoshopped and you were so horrible to me when we met, _fuck you_ , Patrick.”

Jesus. Christ.

Jane thinks that Red John needs to get laid. To rest. Seriously, Red John just needs to die already, but Jane has no gun and no knife, and he feels that murdering a man who’s drunk and has just thrown his heart across the bed to you, would be just a tad unfair.

“Hey,” he says softly, and wisely does not put a hand on Red John’s shoulder. He realizes, with something like a jolt, that he’s unironically trying to think of a way to _comfort Red John_. And then he thinks that someone should just erase the last few weeks from his life, thank you very much.

Jane’s about to say something interesting and profound, when the air is knocked out of him and he’s thrown backwards into the bed, a pair of hands around his neck, shaking him wildly.

“What the hell,” he manages to wheeze out, his own hair flying everywhere, dark spots clouding his vision.

Red John is suddenly on top of him. Still shaking him. Jane contemplates vomiting right at his face. “Why. Don’t. You. _Like me_ ,” Red John hisses at him, like he truly has no idea. And Jane, Jane knows that he won’t let himself die here, under Red fucking John, inside Red fucking John’s house, after he’s eaten Red fucking John’s donuts.

So he does the only sensible thing one can do in situations such as these, and instead of grasping and clawing at Red John’s hands, he knees the man in the balls.

 

 

The morning after is silent and sullen and Jane wants to hit himself for having thought of it as ‘the morning after’.

Red John eats his breakfast and watches Jane not eating his, frowning and chiding and pouting like nothing’s happened. Jane wants to _scream_.

Instead, he forces a pleasant sort of smile and asks, “What’s today’s schedule? Delivering parking tickets across the beautiful land of Napa?”

Red John just glares. “That’s… not what I do. I deal with important crimes, you know.”

“Ah, of course.” Jane tilts his head to the side. “Like, say, stolen bicycles? Drunk driving youths?” His eyes widen. “ _Burglaries_?”

Red John throws his french toast at Jane’s face.

 

 

Lisbon desperately wants her gun back. There are at least half a dozen people in the immediate vicinity she’d like to shoot, her own team included. Scowling, she lets herself slump into her chair, watching as Rigsby and Van Pelt continue their heated debate on whether Jane would or would not sleep with Red John, if it meant getting around to killing the guy eventually.

“Oh come _on_ , he’d totally tap it,” Rigsby hollers, exasperated. “He did the nasty with Lorelei already, didn’t he? That’s basically fucking Red John by proxy. If he thinks there’s a chance he can manipulate Red John with sex, I bet you fifty bucks he’d do it.”

Van Pelt looks like she wants to throw something heavy across the room. Lisbon echoes the sentiment heartily. “And _I_ ’m telling _you_ that Red John’s kidnapped him and his life is in danger,” she says, huffing and puffing. If she were a bird, her feathers would be ruffled. In the most intimidating sort of way. “We have to _do_ something!”

“We are,” Cho interjects, in that dry monotone of his that Lisbon is suddenly thankful for. “We’ve looked everywhere. There’s not much we can accomplish without legal authority.”

“Oh, screw that,” Van Pelt snaps, and Rigsby’s eyes bulge at the absurdity of his pure and virginal sweetheart cursing. Lisbon shakes her head. “Red John could be _torturing_ him. Jane could be _dead_. Who cares about the rules, we have to _find_ him.”

Cho merely blinks.

Lisbon buries her face in her hands.

 

 

“He really likes you, you know,” Lorelei comments idly, not bothering to look up from filing her nails. “Like, _likes_ likes you.”

Jane goes very, very still. “Please stop.”

Lorelei gives him a winsome smirk. “He just can’t think with the _right_ head when it comes to you. The upper one. After I came back from our oh so passionate night together, he literally made me walk him through the whole thing. He was obsessed.” The smirk widens into a full blown smile. “And impressed. _Very_ impressed.”

Patrick Jane is a gentleman. This is what he tells himself as he reasons why he doesn’t smash Lorelei’s face into a wall. She just laughs, and Jane sighs, resigned.

 

 

Jane has just come out of the shower, and he’s very painfully aware of Red John trying to stare at him without looking like he’s staring at him.

 _Oh, what the hell_.

“You went overboard with the rose soap again,” Red John comments, strangely choked. Jane wants to hide behind a solid brick wall, and at the same time not at all. Mostly, he just wants to punch Red John in the face and serve his liver at a fancy dinner. With fava beans, like an avenger sort of Hannibal Lecter. There’d be some sort of poetic justice to that, he believes.

“Huh,” is his brilliant response, and Red John arches an eyebrow, apparently drawn out of his hormonal reverie.

“Look,” he says in a serious tone that instantly makes Jane wary. The last time he heard that kind of voice employed by Red John, the psychopath had wanted to drag Jane along on an after-hours activity that involved knives, decapitation and copious amounts of blood. “You’re going to do something for me.”

Instinctively, Jane squares his shoulders and glares. “No I’m not.”

Red John apparently stops himself from pouting at the very last moment. “Yes, dear, you are. I make the rules here, remember?”

“Ah. Here we go again with the pre-schooler superiority complex,” Jane says scathingly. “And don’t call me dear. It’s annoying. You’re annoying.”

Red John tilts his head to the side. It’s a good thing he’s not carrying any weapons, because it seems that he’d love to use one, effectively, right about now. “Alright,” he says, obviously struggling to keep calm and composed. If Jane was a lesser man, he’d roll his eyes. “Alright. Patrick, I want you to talk to Agent Lisbon, and address the CBI in general.”

 _That_ catches Jane’s attention. It also makes him feel very strange and cold and vaguely afraid. “Thanks, but no thanks.”

“Don’t be a child,” Red John says impatiently, waving a dismissive hand. “I just want them to know you’re alive and well and not in danger. That’s all. _Dear_.”

“Huh,” Jane says again, dimly aware that his choice of words has been rather unimpressive today. “I think you mean you want them to know I’m here, with you, of my own accord. And you want them to think you’re basically fucking me. As if they’d ever believe you. I mean, do you really think that’s ever going to happen?”

Red John coughs and sputters and refuses to even respond to that.

 

 

During the next few days, Jane keeps mulling over Lorelei’s words, and can’t help but envision all the woebegone, soulful smolders Red John has been giving him since he first came here.

The thing is, he _knows_ the psychotic asshole has a crush on him ―or whatever passes for a crush in a serial killer’s world. The other thing is, Jane knows he should be very, very disgusted and terrified, but all he can think of is how to use this to his advantage. He’s not _flattered_ or anything. Besides, a lot of people have crushes on him. It’s a natural consequence of being pretty and charming and just the right amount of douchebag.

So, it’s easy enough for him to accidentally drop things and bend over to pick them up as slowly as humanly possible whenever Red John is in the room. It’s easy to complain about the poor air conditioning and pop _several_ of his shirt buttons open in an attempt to cool off. It’s easy to change underwear in front of the guy without a shame in the world, while Red John mouths wordlessly for a moment and then shakes his head in defeat.

Jane isn’t sure if it’s _working_ , but he’s definitely getting somewhere. Or, he hopes he is.

 

 

“I’m not gay,” Red John sullenly tells Lorelei that night. He’s clinging to her like a disheveled barnacle, and she suspects it has everything to do with witnessing Jane try on a new set of boxer briefs earlier in the day.

“You don’t have to prove anything by sleeping with me,” she says resignedly, letting her head slump back into the pillow. She doesn’t mind this, exactly, but it _is_ getting tiring. She’s seriously contemplating locking both Red John and Patrick up inside a broom closet and keeping them there until they fuck or murder each other. Or both. “I mean, it’s kinda obvious that you’re not that into it.”

Which, wrong choice of words.

“Not that _into_ it?” Red John repeats, incredulous and mightily offended. “I― Are you _dissatisfied_?”

“Er.” Lorelei fumbles around for a metaphorical bandage. “I mean, darling, you were great, obviously, but, uh. Well―”

“ _Well_?”

Lorelei gulps down something very ugly that has caught in her throat. “I… uh. You see, my mother always told me self-denial isn’t healthy,” she says, and abruptly stops herself once she realizes she’s veering into Ten Steps To A Healthier You! territory. “What I’m saying is, there’s absolutely nothing wrong or weird about being attracted to other men. And there’s definitely nothing weird about being attracted to _Patrick Jane_. I bet even frogs want a piece of that gorgeous blond―”

“Lorelei, if you keep talking, I will _skin_ you,” Red John says with barely concealed rage, and even though she’s arguably quite horrified, Lorelei has to stifle something like a laugh.

 

 

Rigsby is triumphant as he barges into Lisbon’s personal space, which can’t be good.

“I knew it,” he squeals (manfully, because Van Pelt is giving him the side-eye). He looks about ready to fist-pump into the air, and Cho, trailing behind him, just looks tired.

“What did you know?” Lisbon asks with infinite patience. Van Pelt just makes a disapproving clucking sound with her tongue and determinedly looks away.

“Red John,” Rigsby clarifies, nervous but also almost grinning. No one should be able to pull of _fearful glee_ , but the last few weeks of Jane’s inexplicable absence and Darcy’s dictatorship have turned them all into masters of the mixed emotion. “He sent a message.”

Chaos ensues.

Lisbon shoots up from her desk, papers flying everywhere. Van Pelt’s eyes widen and she claps a hand over her mouth, biting down a gasp, while Cho translates his profound horror through a subtle flexing of his arm muscles.

It’s an outstandingly fortunate thing that the FBI’s not here.

“What message? Does he have Jane? _Is Jane okay_?”

Rigsby holds out a DVD. “He’s okay, boss. I’m telling you, he’s playing Red John like a fiddle. I was right, he’s using the sex card. _I. Knew. It_.”

Lisbon forces herself to breathe. In out, in out. “Why do I not believe this? Do I want to believe this?”

Behind them, Van Pelt collapses on a chair with an indignant cry. Cho makes a humming sound that could mean anything at all. Lisbon just slides the DVD into the computer, and keeps muttering _Oh, God_ , under her breath throughout the whole thing.

 

 


End file.
